Psalm 9

1 I will give thanks to you, Lord, with my whole heart;  I will tell of all your marvellous works.2 I will be glad and rejoice in you;  I will make music to your name, O Most High.3 When my enemies are driven back,  they stumble and perish at your presence.4 For you have maintained my right and my cause;  you sat on your throne giving righteous judgement.5 You have rebuked the nations and destroyed the wicked;  you have blotted out their name for ever and ever.6 The enemy was utterly laid waste.  You uprooted their cities; their very memory has perished.7 But the Lord shall endure for ever;  he has made fast his throne for judgement.8 For he shall rule the world with righteousness  and govern the peoples with equity.9 Then will the Lord be a refuge for the oppressed,  a refuge in the time of trouble.10 And those who know your name will put their trust in you,  for you, Lord, have never failed those who seek you.11 Sing praises to the Lord who dwells in Zion;  declare among the peoples the things he has done.12 The avenger of blood has remembered them;  he did not forget the cry of the oppressed.13 Have mercy upon me, O Lord;  consider the trouble I suffer from those who hate me, you that lift me up from the gates of death;14 That I may tell all your praises in the gates of the city of Zion  and rejoice in your salvation.15 The nations shall sink into the pit of their making  and in the snare which they set will their own foot be taken.16 The Lord makes himself known by his acts of justice;  the wicked are snared in the works of their own hands.17 They shall return to the land of darkness,  all the nations that forget God.18 For the needy shall not always be forgotten  and the hope of the poor shall not perish for ever.19 Arise, O Lord, and let not mortals have the upper hand;  let the nations be judged before your face.20 Put them in fear, O Lord,  that the nations may know themselves to be but mortal.

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Isaiah 40:18-31

18 To whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare with him?
19 An idol? A workman casts it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold, and casts for it silver chains.
20 As a gift one chooses mulberry wood* wood that will not rotthen seeks out a skilled artisan to set up an image that will not topple.

21 Have you not known? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
22 It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers;who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to live in;
23 who brings princes to naught, and makes the rulers of the earth as nothing.

24 Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown, scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth,when he blows upon them, and they wither, and the tempest carries them off like stubble.

25 To whom then will you compare me, or who is my equal? says the Holy One.
26 Lift up your eyes on high and see: Who created these?He who brings out their host and numbers them, calling them all by name;because he is great in strength, mighty in power, not one is missing.

27 Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel,My way is hidden from the Lord, and my right is disregarded by my God?
28 Have you not known? Have you not heard?The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable.
29 He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless.
30 Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted;
31 but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles,they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

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Mark 1:14-28

The Beginning of the Galilean Ministry

14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news* of God,*15and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near;* repent, and believe in the good news.*

Jesus Calls the First Disciples

16 As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lakefor they were fishermen.
17And Jesus said to them, Follow me and I will make you fish for people.
18And immediately they left their nets and followed him.
19As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets.
20Immediately he called them; and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, and followed him.

The Man with an Unclean Spirit

21 They went to Capernaum; and when the sabbath came, he entered the synagogue and taught.
22They were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.
23Just then there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit,
24and he cried out, What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.
25But Jesus rebuked him, saying, Be silent, and come out of him!
26And the unclean spirit, throwing him into convulsions and crying with a loud voice, came out of him.
27They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, What is this? A new teachingwith authority! He* commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.
28At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.